In recent years, adherents to the alt-right, a radically nationalist and xenophobic faction of the American right wing, have increasingly made their presenceknown, both in the digital sphere and in the streets. But while the term “alt-right” may evoke images of its most prominent partisans — white supremacists and neo-Nazis — in practice, it is a much more dangerously complex spectrum of political views.
Despite this, most discussions of online radicalization focus largely around the descent into these extremist groups, and not the subtle ways in which the echo chambers and deliberate isolation of the alt-right’s indoctrination networks operate. These networks, collectively known as the “alt-right pipeline,” are especially dangerous to young men, but a narrow discussion of the pipeline’s threat means that the full scope of the issue is rarely addressed. From the violent extremes to the tamer, but much broader, wing of the “alt-lite” (a faction dominated by popular conservative commentators and public firebrands), the same tactics are used to exploit and radicalize the rising generation. I speak from personal experience when I say that failing to address the alt-right pipeline as a complex and multidimensional issue only serves to make it stronger.
The conventional wisdom is that the alt-right pipeline targets white men who are angry at the world, a group that originally self-identified as “involuntarily celibate,” birthing the abbreviation “incel.” These observers rightfully point out the pervasive misogyny of the alt-right, and treat it as a vehicle and prerequisite for radicalization. While this interpretation of the alt-right, one that emphasizes the pipeline’s exploitation of latent misogyny and sexual frustration through “male bonding” gone horribly awry, is accurate in many cases, it cannot be applied to every case of alt-right internet radicalization. I, for example, was only thirteen when my fall down the pipeline began. My fatal element was not male rage but self-doubt.
For most of my childhood, I was incredibly susceptible to peer pressure. I developed a personal identity, but my public identity was often whatever I thought would fit in best. The problem was only exacerbated when I hit puberty. I was an atheist when my predominantly Catholic friends were bonding over teaching religious education classes at their churches, a progressive but only beginning to understand the importance of what that meant, and starting to come to terms with what I now know to be my bisexuality. At the time, I was unsure of who I was supposed to be, or even who I was.
This was around the same time that YouTube began to play a larger role in my life, and there, I found my gateway drug to the alt-right: Dave Rubin. In Rubin, I saw a vision of myself; he was an openly gay atheist man who called himself a “classical liberal.” I began watching the Rubin Report on YouTube religiously, and slowly but surely bought into his message: the modern left’s obsession with “identity politics” went too far. The assertion was straightforward enough for me to understand, and having next to no frame of reference with which to refute it, I did the only thing I thought epistemically sound: accept it as true.
I was working my way through Rubin’s content when I found his multi-part interview with alt-right provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos, during which Yiannopoulos half-heartedly described African-Americans as being the last oppressed group in the United States. I had no experience with the nuance of condemnable views in American politics, so even Yiannaopoulos’s begrudging admission of any form of systemic racism was enough to convince me that he was worth more attention than I previously thought. With Yiannopoulos’s points going unchallenged, I was led to believe that his rhetoric held a legitimate place in the political spectrum. Once again, with no frame of reference to do otherwise, I accepted that I must have been wrong about him, and considered myself responsible for learning more about his perspective.
I gradually cycled through the videos that my new, extremely skewed frame of reference deemed “acceptable,” avoiding only the most flagrant content. By then, however, YouTube had worked its magic and determined what would appeal to me most moving forward. Videos recommended through the YouTube algorithm account for 70 percent of time spent on the site. Without thinking, I let the “up next” timer run down, and I was directed to the next video then the next, each more aggressive than the last.
And so began a months-long tumble down the alt-right pipeline, but I was never able to acknowledge that I was trapped. I still considered myself a progressive; in my mind, I was not buying into the alt-right’s rhetoric, I was learning their arguments to make my progressivism stronger. But I was more easily persuaded than I knew, and even if my intentions were sound, Ben Shapiro spoke too quickly and Steven Crowder too aggressively for me to be able to process what I was hearing beyond a superficial level. My teenage mind could not keep up, and without any conscious understanding, I was cheering along with Jordan Peterson as he “destroyed” feminism and as “SJWs” were “owned” with “facts and logic.” Before I could think through what I had watched, I was onto the next video, and my internal understanding of the world became echoes of Louder with Crowder, the Daily Wire, and PragerU.Assuming I was merely developing a more nuanced understanding of the world, the true weight of what I was watching never set in with me. I began referring to myself as a “social conservative,” but never publicly. I figured discussing it with my friends was a non-starter; after all, in my mind, they had fallen victim to the machinations of the “radical left.” I was the enlightened one.
But even as I tumbled headfirst down the alt-right pipeline, I never fell far enough to seal myself into a true echo chamber. In fact, what I broadly defined as my “social conservatism” rarely left YouTube. The outside world continued around me unaffected; the only impact was in how I saw it. I certainly never shared these hateful views with anyone, because on some subconscious level, I still knew that they were unacceptable for a reason.
I resigned myself to the fact that I would forever be misunderstood, because the alt-right only knows, and therefore only teaches, two emotions: anger and fear. Both of these are generalized and are used to target, broadly, “the unknown;” anything the alt-right does not understand, like, or benefit from, it views as inherently dangerous. In my time, the prime example of this was the concept of “intersectionality.” I never learned the true definition of intersectionality, that racial, ethnic, and class identities intersect with one another and should be included in progressive movements. Instead, I learned Ben Shapiro’s definition, that “according to current leftist orthodoxy, your opinion only matters relative to your identity.”
I began to see the world the way those commentators saw it. I felt threatened where there was no threat, attacked where there was no attacker, and defensive of this new identity I had been given, an identity I had never wanted to have. The world I experienced and the world I saw were fundamentally disconnected. Overwhelmed, I sank into a depression. Their anger and fear had broken me, but it had not made me angry or afraid. It had just made me sad.
In the end, that disconnect was what saved me from sinking into the fascism and white supremacy of the alt-right’s public persona. Real life is not as rapid-fire or one-sided as alt-right YouTube, and when I found my peers discussing the ideas that I had been indoctrinated to believe, I realized that the people I respected had clear and concise refutations to each of those ideas. The pipeline had given me definitions of things like intersectionality, social justice, and even feminism that were dangerously inaccurate, and when I actually began challenging the views pressed upon me, they fell like dominoes.
During my time in the alt-right pipeline, I found myself echoing reactionary talking points because I had been told to see conflict where none was necessary. I was inexperienced, and that made me the alt-right’s perfect target.
If we as a society are to genuinely address the root causes of the alt-right pipeline, we must come to terms with what it actually is. While it often capitalizes on the worst of human impulses, it also capitalizes on naivete and ignorant innocence, regardless of age or circumstance. It looks different for everyone, from the veteran told to fear “racial replacement” by Tucker Carlson to the teenager who lingered too long on a promoted Will Witt video on Facebook. For those who know no better, the alt-right is a comprehensive and comprehensible way of understanding the world.
Refutations and rebuttals of alt-right talking points must also be adapted to the digital sphere. Right-wing pundits and commentators have the most popular podcasts, Facebook pages, and YouTube channels, meaning that they are often the first thing a person genuinely looking for political discourse will find. The alt-right has already adapted to the internet and is using their head-start to indoctrinate a generation. To combat this, viable alternatives to the alt-right’s demagogic rhetoric must be available to discourage people from internalizing its narrative.
Lastly, the alt-right pipeline must be addressed as a public health issue. I was never happier when I “found my identity” in the alt-right than I had been before or than I am now. Caught in the alt-right spiral, I told myself the world misunderstood me, when in reality, I had just cut myself off from it. My mental health only recovered when I escaped the pipeline.
Falling down the alt-right pipeline is an intensely personal process, and it must be addressed as a personal issue. But more importantly, it must be acknowledged that the alt-right pipeline doesn’t lead anywhere: It just keeps descending. And while that means it will become harder and harder to address with time, it also means no one is ever too far gone.
Returning from the alt-right pipeline was without question the greatest triumph of my adolescent life. Only then was I able to fully appreciate the rich diversity of our world and understand the nuances necessary to make genuine progress. More than ever before, too, I was able to understand myself, and fully embrace who I truly was, not the person the alt-right told me I should be.
The internet is still largely in its infancy, but the alt-right and its intermediaries have already been able to establish a funnel to create new acolytes. To combat it, we must first understand it, in all of its complexity.
Image by Ales Nesetril is licensed under the Unsplash License.
Bureau of Ethical and Sensitive Reporting Chief
